"Senior Brother Abbot."
Tianming hurried into Mahavira Hall.
But this time, instead of being greeted with welcoming looks, he was met with a distinctly displeased expression.
Here we go again?
Who was it this time?
Damn it, he had said that Shaolin Temple had lacked prestige in recent years and told them to keep an eye out for talented disciples.
Xuankong, who had mastered Arhat Gong, had undoubtedly made him very happy.
Xuancheng, who had mastered Great Strength Vajra Palm, had also made him happy for a while.
When Xuanci mastered Great Strength Vajra Palm, he had beamed from ear to ear. With those three little fellows, Shaolin Temple would be in good hands in the future.
Xuancheng, in particular, could serve as the sect's poster boy for the next thirty years.
Then, once Xuankong and Xuanci hit their stride—and especially once Xuankong cultivated the Arhat Golden Body—the next heads of Shaolin Temple's Bodhidharma Institute, Arhat Hall, and Prajna Hall were practically decided.
But before long, Monk Tianjian couldn't take it anymore.
Xuannan, Dragon Subduing Elephant Taming Art.
Xuanji, Great Strength Vajra Palm.
Xuanku, Dragon Subduing Elephant Taming Art.
Xuanbei, Dragon Subduing Elephant Taming Art.
Xuandu, Dragon Subduing Elephant Taming Art.
What the hell, were they messing with him??? If they weren't going to give him anyone, fine, don't give him anyone. But if they were going to, did they have to go this overboard?
Even after sixty years of Buddhist cultivation, Abbot Tianjian couldn't take it anymore.
Did they think raising disciples cost nothing???
Those eight had already become a headache to feed over the past two years. Xuancheng led the pack, eating at least eight steamed buns per meal.
Shaolin Temple's steamed buns weren't the fluffy, fermented kind. They were solid buns, each weighing a full two jin. Eight of them came to sixteen jin. In one meal, those eight bottomless pits could put away 128 jin of flour—one shi, or 280 copper coins.
And that was only the buns. Then there were the vegetables, oil, salt, and so on. Lately, they'd even started buying vegetables from outside, costing another 260 copper coins or so.
One meal cost 540 copper coins.
A day cost 1,620 copper coins.
A month came to 48,600 copper coins, nearly five strings of cash, or five taels of silver.
Just their living expenses were already a huge outlay, for crying out loud.
Of course, that alone wouldn't have been a problem. But the thing was...
Whether it was Arhat Divine Art, Great Strength Vajra Palm, or Dragon Subduing Elephant Taming Art, none of them could be mastered just by knuckling down and practicing.
Great Strength Vajra Palm went without saying: external applications and internal medicines to invigorate the blood and strengthen the body. One full course of the ingredients cost about fifty taels.
Dragon Subduing Elephant Taming Art only required internal medicines, but they weren't cheap either. One full course cost fifty taels.
For both of those, a single course lasted only a month.
And then there was Arhat Divine Art, the real money pit. Blood Qi Pills weren't as precious as Great Restoration Pills, but they still needed blood-boosting ingredients like ginseng, angelica, fleeceflower root, and snow lotus. Those weren't cheap. A single batch could yield a hundred pills, but cost a thousand taels of silver.
In other words, those eight little rascals had cost 5,200 taels of silver over the past year.
Shaolin Temple had a sizable estate, sure, but money didn't grow on trees. And with all those other monks to feed, house, and train, they couldn't just look after those eight. The annual expenses were so enormous they simply couldn't afford them, for crying out loud. Faced with this, lately Monk Tianjian had begun wondering where he could find new sources of income. Damn it, he was the Abbot of Shaolin Temple, and for the past month, instead of thinking about sutras and Buddhist cultivation, he'd been thinking about how to make money.
It was enough to make a man miserable!
Don't recommend anyone else.
Eight was already more than enough. Really, more than enough.
Other sects only had one or two first-rate experts.
Just look at the Xiaoyao Sect. That old codger Xiaoyao Patriarch had only raised three disciples before he stopped accepting students, founded no sect, and drifted off overseas, never to return.
It had to be said that although Li Su had been careful not to alter history, he had still changed it in practice. Because he didn't want to expose himself, he'd adopted a routine of getting things done before practicing martial arts. As a result, all eight of them had stayed together, leaving the other seven with plenty of free time. Encouraging one another, their martial arts had naturally advanced by leaps and bounds.
So lately, whenever Tianjian heard Tianming's name, he got a headache. If he hadn't been the one to ask for talented disciples to strengthen Shaolin Temple, he truly couldn't have stopped himself from cursing him out.
Doing his best to control his emotions, Abbot Tianjian took a breath and calmly asked, "What is it?"
"Xuankong has cultivated the Arhat Golden Body. He's already reached the minor success stage."
Tianjian's pupils contracted. It wasn't just him; Tianwen and Tianxing beside him couldn't help opening their eyes wide, either.
Tianwen and Tianxing were the heads of the Bodhidharma Institute and the Discipline Hall, respectively.
When they'd heard that a disciple had mastered Arhat Gong, they'd been shocked and delighted. Shaolin had an heir, hadn't it?
But it had only been a year. And already, he'd cultivated the Arhat Golden Body? That was truly extraordinary.
Could Shaolin Temple be about to produce a Wuyazi of its own?
"Then his pills must be used up by now, right?"
"Yes."
"I understand. Junior Brother Tianwen, go inform Junior Brother Tianmo to start another batch of Blood Qi Pills..."
At that, Monk Tianjian's face twitched, and his words came to an abrupt halt.
Beside him, Tianwen and Tianxing exchanged glances, then lowered their eyes and said nothing.
Didn't they know Shaolin Temple's situation?
They did!
The year wasn't even over, and they'd already spent 5,200 taels of silver—520 taels of gold. As a result, they'd had to scrap the original plan to repair the Buddha statue in Mahavira Hall and gild it. Instead, they'd bought gold leaf and pasted it on.
Amitabha Buddha... What a sin, what a sin. Buddha, it wasn't that they lacked sincerity; they simply had the will but not the means...
"Senior Brother?"
Tianming was stunned. Why had he stopped halfway through?
Abbot Tianjian gritted his teeth, then turned to look at Tianwen.
Tianwen took a breath. As head of the Bodhidharma Institute, he was in charge of Shaolin Temple's finances.
"Senior Brother, there are only 186 taels of silver and 30 strings of copper cash in the accounts. The next time we collect income is still four months away. Shaolin Temple's average monthly expenses are around 40 strings of cash... And we don't have enough medicinal ingredients to refine Blood Qi Pills. We'll need to replenish our stocks."
Hiss...
So the money they had left wasn't enough?
Abbot Tianjian felt his cheek twitch. His liver ached.
Tianming was stunned for a moment, then understood why his senior brother had stopped halfway through.
They were actually out of money!
He immediately flew into a rage. With an estate as vast as Shaolin Temple's, how could they have so little money left? Senior Brother Tianjian, how had he been running Shaolin Temple?
"Senior Brother, why does Shaolin Temple have so little money left? With an estate this large, just the farmland alone—"
Tianjian's face darkened, and he cut him off. "Xuankong, Xuancheng, Xuanci, Xuanku, Xuannan, Xuandu, Xuanbei, and Xuanji spent 5,200 taels of silver this year."
Hiss~!?
Tianming was dumbfounded. 5,200 taels—and in silver?
Though he didn't know much about money, he knew that 5,200 taels was an enormous amount. No, it was terrifyingly enormous.
Abbot Tianjian sighed, his face clouded with worry. "Sometimes, having too many talented disciples isn't necessarily a good thing."
They all nodded almost at once, especially Monk Tianwen, who looked deeply shaken.
Damn it, they were too costly.
"Then what do we do?" Tianming grew anxious. They couldn't neglect Xuankong's talent. He was a pillar of Shaolin Temple's future.
After suffering a toothache for a while, Tianjian said, "Teach him another martial art. Put this one on hold for now..." They couldn't afford it. Even if they drank nothing but water for the next four months, they still wouldn't have enough to buy the medicinal ingredients he needed. What, were they supposed to dig them up themselves? Did they think ginseng grew like cabbages, everywhere? There were so many sects these days that anything with a few years on it had already been dug up clean. Why else were wild ginseng roots from the Changbai Mountains so prized? There were few people there and plenty of them. Otherwise, cold ginseng wasn't all that suitable as an ingredient for certain pills.
Monk Tianming took a breath. Even the cleverest housewife couldn't cook a meal without rice. After thinking it over, he asked, "What should we teach him?"
Tianjian rolled his eyes. What else? Shaolin Temple had so many unique arts. Just teach him any one of them—
Hiss...!
Damn it, it really wasn't easy to choose.
If he could master Arhat Divine Art, his talent went without saying. The Arhat Golden Body itself had an exceptionally powerful capacity to adapt. Once mastered, it made learning other martial arts especially quick. He might pick up a simple one in a few days, but advanced arts still cost money.
Arhat Divine Art was already a money pit. If they added another costly art on top, it would be a real headache. The sect's annual income couldn't even cover the training costs of those eight.
"Teach him a finger technique. Finger techniques don't require internal energy to practice. They'll only need deep internal energy to use later, so it's a perfect fit."
Tianming thought it over and immediately understood what the other man meant. Finger techniques were different from other arts: he only needed to learn the moves now, and his future progress would depend on his own internal energy. Besides, Xuankong had been practicing internal cultivation for more than three years, and his foundation was solid. Even Xuancheng couldn't match him. But when it came to actual martial techniques, he was clearly lacking—not only compared to Xuancheng, but even the weakest, Xuandu. He nodded at once. "Understood."